FrankRep
08-03-2009, 01:18 PM
Glenn Beck Exposes Cars.gov Malicious Behavior
Government Site Cars.gov Threatens Privacy (http://www.jbs.org/us-constitution-blog/5181-glenn-beck-exposes-carsgov-malicious-behavior)
JBS Staff | John Birch Society (http://www.jbs.org/)
03 August 2009
If you think the "cash for clunkers" program is all sweetness and light, and that this is an example of the federal government helping the little guy, well, think again. Apart from the very questionable constitutional basis for the program (what Constitution? Anybody see a Constitution around here?) Glenn Beck of Fox News points out that the government operated website threatens your privacy, and claims to own your computer if you happen to click on the wrong link (http://www.jbs.org/news-center/birchtube/164-Glenn+Beck%3A+Carsgov+allows+government+to+takeove r+your+computer).
Critics claim that Beck is making a mountain out of a mole hill. One of these is blogger Chris Thomas who writes of Beck's concerns (http://trueslant.com/christopherthomas/2009/08/01/glenn-beck-and-the-governments-fictional-plot-to-hijack-your-computer/#post_comments):
Beck pitches the entire story as if regular consumers are going to log on to the cars.gov website and, in the course of their use, encounter this message and blithely click “ok,” thereby giving the government’s jackbooted thugs the right to check out their financial spreadsheets and boost a copy of their porn collection.
That’s not going to happen.
An astute viewer of Beck’s expose might notice that the website that Beck is browsing is blue whereas the cars.gov website is green. This is no trick of the studio lights; though he never mentions it, what Beck is demonstrating only occurs on the dealer side of the website. The consumer side - the side that anyone who is not an automotive dealer will access - is green. What Beck demonstrates is not even something that a casual user of the site could stumble upon; they would have to go looking for it.
Thomas is right, as far as he goes. Most consumers will not be faced with a message telling them that their computer and everything on it is now the property of the U.S. government. But that doesn't really improve the situation at all. Car dealers, being the entities most affected, are still supposedly private entities -- and an affront to their privacy is really no improvement over an affront to the privacy of the average citizen.
Thomas makes the other valid point that "a quick Google Search turns up more than 800 instances of the “Any or all uses of this system and all files on this system…” verbiage on a collection of public and private sites." But, what does that do to make the overreach less harmful? Actually, it makes it worse because the chance that the average citizen is going to run afoul of one of these sites is greater simply because there are more of them.
Critics have some good points to make about this, primarily when they point out that those accessing government sites need to be aware of the conditions under which they access those sites, then proceed on a "buyer beware" basis.
But that still misses the problem, namely, that government has far exceeded its constitutional bounds. If it were kept within its legitimate sphere by the Constitution, and by a wary citizenry demanding fidelity to the nation's founding law, we wouldn't see programs like the recent bailouts, nationalizations, spying programs, and cash for clunkers, among many more. And, as a result, we wouldn't have to worry about the abuses of power these programs may enable.
SOURCE:
http://www.jbs.org/us-constitution-blog/5181-glenn-beck-exposes-carsgov-malicious-behavior
Government Site Cars.gov Threatens Privacy (http://www.jbs.org/us-constitution-blog/5181-glenn-beck-exposes-carsgov-malicious-behavior)
JBS Staff | John Birch Society (http://www.jbs.org/)
03 August 2009
If you think the "cash for clunkers" program is all sweetness and light, and that this is an example of the federal government helping the little guy, well, think again. Apart from the very questionable constitutional basis for the program (what Constitution? Anybody see a Constitution around here?) Glenn Beck of Fox News points out that the government operated website threatens your privacy, and claims to own your computer if you happen to click on the wrong link (http://www.jbs.org/news-center/birchtube/164-Glenn+Beck%3A+Carsgov+allows+government+to+takeove r+your+computer).
Critics claim that Beck is making a mountain out of a mole hill. One of these is blogger Chris Thomas who writes of Beck's concerns (http://trueslant.com/christopherthomas/2009/08/01/glenn-beck-and-the-governments-fictional-plot-to-hijack-your-computer/#post_comments):
Beck pitches the entire story as if regular consumers are going to log on to the cars.gov website and, in the course of their use, encounter this message and blithely click “ok,” thereby giving the government’s jackbooted thugs the right to check out their financial spreadsheets and boost a copy of their porn collection.
That’s not going to happen.
An astute viewer of Beck’s expose might notice that the website that Beck is browsing is blue whereas the cars.gov website is green. This is no trick of the studio lights; though he never mentions it, what Beck is demonstrating only occurs on the dealer side of the website. The consumer side - the side that anyone who is not an automotive dealer will access - is green. What Beck demonstrates is not even something that a casual user of the site could stumble upon; they would have to go looking for it.
Thomas is right, as far as he goes. Most consumers will not be faced with a message telling them that their computer and everything on it is now the property of the U.S. government. But that doesn't really improve the situation at all. Car dealers, being the entities most affected, are still supposedly private entities -- and an affront to their privacy is really no improvement over an affront to the privacy of the average citizen.
Thomas makes the other valid point that "a quick Google Search turns up more than 800 instances of the “Any or all uses of this system and all files on this system…” verbiage on a collection of public and private sites." But, what does that do to make the overreach less harmful? Actually, it makes it worse because the chance that the average citizen is going to run afoul of one of these sites is greater simply because there are more of them.
Critics have some good points to make about this, primarily when they point out that those accessing government sites need to be aware of the conditions under which they access those sites, then proceed on a "buyer beware" basis.
But that still misses the problem, namely, that government has far exceeded its constitutional bounds. If it were kept within its legitimate sphere by the Constitution, and by a wary citizenry demanding fidelity to the nation's founding law, we wouldn't see programs like the recent bailouts, nationalizations, spying programs, and cash for clunkers, among many more. And, as a result, we wouldn't have to worry about the abuses of power these programs may enable.
SOURCE:
http://www.jbs.org/us-constitution-blog/5181-glenn-beck-exposes-carsgov-malicious-behavior